People with personal health budgets are being asked to complete a survey designed to help improve the support for budget holders and applicants in England.
The NHS has commissioned Chesterfield-based firm Quality Health to run the survey, which will last until 14th May 2019, to gather feedback about people’s experiences of personal health budgets ( PHB ) and integrated personal budgets ( IPB ) including personal wheelchair budgets.
It is open to all current or previous budget holders and those who support them, and the NHS would like anyone who took part in their 2018 survey to do so again this year. Last year it was found that 86% said they had achieved what they wanted as a result of their plan, to some extent or completely, and 77% said they were likely or extremely likely to recommend a PHB/IPB to someone else.
Participants also gave NHS England helpful feedback on how to improve their experience of PHBs. So far, in response to this, the NHS has:
• Started a new project to explore further the challenges people face with recruiting and employing personal assistants
• Launched #myPHBstory to capture and share people’s stories
• Co-produced and delivered a series of eight workshops to commissioners to help them improve their offer of personal health budgets for NHS Continuing Healthcare
• Developed long-term plans to offer better information, advice and support for those entitled to or interested in a personal health budget.
• Started training more people with lived experience to influence systems and support individuals working towards longer-term commitments.
• Improved the quality of information available to personal health budget holders and commissioners supporting personal health budgets
You can see this year’s survey here. If you have any queries about the questionnaire or about how your information may be used, or if you require help completing the questionnaire, please call the FREEPHONE helpline number on 0800 783 1775. A translation service is also available if required.
